The musings of a madman...

     I don’t know if y’all noticed, but I been away since Christmas Eve.  Consistent output every Thursday morning at 7:30am with the exception of a reset week I took in October. One could assign my disappearance to it being SATURDAY before I noticed that last Thursday was Thursday.  That would be too easy an explanation though.      In fact, that would be too convenient an explanation in a world where the randomest of shit happens to me every few damned days or so. …  so it is the Sunday after Christmas.  I dropped my daughter off with her mother for the week.  I get a phone call, and y’all know I hate those with the burning passion that Mitch McConnell has for poor people. Me: “Uhh…  Hello?” Caller: “Gat-DAYUM, n**ga, don’t act so surprised to hear from me!” Me: “It’s just that your calls usually precede an adventure.” Marlon: “I know man, I’m legit sorry for that.” Me: “Wait, what was that?” Marlon: “What was what?” Me: “What did you just say.” Marlon: “C’mon, m

Y’all remember my monkey, Ian? [link] What about now?      Well anyway…  When we left you in the discussion of Ian, he was at once a purchase that seemed like a good idea in theory but wound up being GODawful in application and came dangerously close to ruining my life to boot. Unable to recoup any of what he cost me, I angrily left him in the pet shop I got him from so he could AT LEAST be rehomed or some shit. About 9 months after the fact, still randomly thinking back to and stewing on the moments I blew buying a fucking monkey as a pet and not a Cane Corso like I wanted, my phone rings… Me: “Hello?” Caller: “What up, though.” Me: “Marlon, you ain’t from Detroit.” Marlon: “How you know that?” Me: “Because I have met your country-ass mama.  Y’all from south Virginia.  What’s the deal.” Marlon: “Shit, chillin man.  What you got going on this weekend?” The sound in his background was familiar, but there is always some random shit happening in his house

     So check it… Last month, my man Marlon came to visit for a weekend with the plan of mopping up behind an old conquest he had failed to take action on in the moment.  As it were, the--…  wait… Read the damn story and come back. Welcome back.      So anyway.  Anyone who knows anything about Greensboro knows that we are the 3 rd largest city in NC and the 68th largest in the United States by population (links for reference/proof) .  With that said, we are not the tiny little Podunk town that public schools in larger states and The Andy Griffith Show would have you believe we are. Until it comes down to who is fuckin’ who.      If I never told y’all this, my True Story© is always rooted in things that actually happened.  Somewhere, somehow, some way.  I leave it up to you, dear reader, to decipher where in the presentation I might be pulling your leg – IF I am pulling your leg. And that is the fun of it.      So as it happened, soon after I posted that story,

(I promise, this will make sense soon enough) “Marlon…  Why does it feel like you’re setting me up for some shit?” “Chill, Phlip, we GOT this…  I have a plan, dude!”      My best-laid plans normally come from the WORST of places.  I don’t know if this is a good or a bad thing, but I s’pect it has a lot to do with why Marlon and I have remained friends for the last 17 years and I am sure that it is precisely where Moe Phillips came from.      For all this time I have known Marlon, he has only “met” Moe twice.  I am more than sure that their first encounter is one of the major reasons we have managed to remain friends for so long despite the shit we have been doing to one another for so long.      It was 2002…  I had just broken up with an ex.  It wasn’t an UGLY breakup so to say; just that she was not from here and when she graduated college, I was still in and her daddy had already paid for her to go to Law School in Texas.  We made shit work long distance fo

     Broke…  Bored…  A little angry at the world in general because shit ain’t quite working out to be just what I feel like it should be.  All I can do is work toward making what I want of the world, I guess. Luckily for me I glean entertainment from the world around me most of the time and I have a network of people who are full-on invited to GET mad at me, but none of them can really STAY mad at me.  That said, I got a phone call… Me: “Hello?” Caller: “Phlip--…  Wait, before you hang up on me man.  You Still mad at me?” Me: “Why the shit would I be mad at you, Marlon?” Marlon: “Well…  You went to pretty extreme lengths to get me back for that dough I costyou last time we spoke.” Me: “Well…  I guess for that I could see myself still mad.  BUT!  I think I have exacted the lesson you needed to learn.” Marlon: “Cool, because I kinda missed coolin’ out and shit.” Me: “Whoa, Marls…  You been in prison or something?  I ain’t living like that.  I am pretty much marrie

     I don’t forget shit… Let me rephrase that, I do forget a great many things, but I don’t forget things that matter a great deal to me.      In August, I told y’all about a job I had taken on helping a dude finally decide whether or not he should go through with marrying his girlfriend.  The work in said story was foiled by one of my mans named Marlon who basically, figuratively and literally fucked my money. [ Link , catch up and come back, you will need it if you do not remember]      Anyway, I am not as mad at Marl as I probably should be for how it went down because – as he so succinctly put it – her ass was absolutely stunning.  Besides, we been friends since middle school and I guess I should have known that he would probably fuck the girl first chance he got. Anyway…      Three weeks ago, Marlon calls me with a quandary… Marlon: “Phlip!” Me: “Whatup Marls?” Marlon: “Shit man…  You good?” Me: “All things considered, still mad about that check

     While I am WILDLY guarded with my phone number, it has also not changed in almost 17 years, so people who had it in 2000-01 still have it.  What this tends to lead to in the days of smartphones is that a friend will get a new phone every once in a while and I get a text or phone call making sure it is still me connected to an otherwise unused (by them) phone number and then I won’t hear from them again until they clean up their phone again.      When I got home from Mexico in June, I got one such call from my dude Rob… *phone rings* Me: “yoooo…” Rob: “Yo…  Phlip?” Me: “Yeah, this me.  Whatup Bobby.” Rob: “Don’t start that shit again, ‘Phil’” Me: “Point taken, what’s good though?” Rob: “Not shit, just got this new phone and cleaning up the list.” Me: “Yeah, I haven’t endeavored any women crazy enough to need to change it.” Rob: “Heh.  Well I had another question though.” Me: “Yeah, what’s the deal?” Rob: “Well, more of a business opportunity.  You sti